Seafoam to clean GDI intake....wow!

[Accent Abuser]

Idle has been getting pretty rough on the Accent, which as of today has 141k on it. I've always used techron or another similar cleaner every oil change but as we all know, this does nothing for the dry intake valves. Yesterday I decided to spray an entire can of seafoam down the intake hose (no maf sensor), didn't get any smoke initially but after letting it sit ten minutes and then driving it about 2 miles it started acting funny like a valve was stuck, all of a sudden CLUNK CLUNK BOOM! A huge cloud of blue and black smoke and what sounded like a bunch of nuts and bolts rattling out the exhaust (probably chunks of carbon), engine immediately ran better.

Hit it a second time today and got even more smoke. Engine now idles perfectly smooth with no shaking and jerking, lot less valve clattering noise as well. My engine hasn't run this smooth since I bought the car. It definitely works for GDI deposits.

 

[walterjay]

Good to hear. Now change the oil.

 

[ctechbob]

Not to be too much of a pessimist, but if the chunks were big enough to hear out the exhaust, they wouldn't have made it through the catalytic converter. You might want to give the cat a once over, although if there was something broken in it, you should be getting P0420 codes or the like.

 

[spasm3]

I'm trying to understand how seafoam could help. Its alcohol and oil. the alcohol flashes off quickly leaving just oil, which is what causes the smoke, not the result of cleaning.

If the problem of DI intake valves is due to oil mist from the pcv circuit going over the valves, then you are doing the same thing with seafoam. Coating the valves with oil which leads to deposits.

The sounds you heard could be you were close to hydrolocking the cylinders.

 

[Accent Abuser]

Not to be too much of a pessimist, but if the chunks were big enough to hear out the exhaust, they wouldn't have made it through the catalytic converter. You might want to give the cat a once over, although if there was something broken in it, you should be getting P0420 codes or the like.

Driven about 300 miles since and no codes.

I'm trying to understand how seafoam could help. Its alcohol and oil. the alcohol flashes off quickly leaving just oil, which is what causes the smoke, not the result of cleaning.

If the problem of DI intake valves is due to oil mist from the pcv circuit going over the valves, then you are doing the same thing with seafoam. Coating the valves with oil which leads to deposits.

The sounds you heard could be you were close to hydrolocking the cylinders.

I just know it runs better afterwards.

 

[incognito_2u]

Although you state it runs better, I would still be concerned with the “Clunk, Clunk, Boom”.

 

[danez_yoda]

You really don't want to do it that way. much better to clean it slowly over time than in one big glunk. if it happened like you said and a bunch of carbon when into the intake valve through the cylinder and out of the exhaust valve, through the cat and then the exhaust there were plenty of places for the "chunks" of carbon to get stuck in the system before getting blown out of the exhaust.

I would bet you worked some carbon loose and maybe cause a stuck valve condition until the car backfired and freed the valve up. It might have worked but its not the type of maintenance I would recommend.

 

[spasm3]

If that was carbon, and that was a turbo engine, it would be done.

 

[Accent Abuser]

You really don't want to do it that way. much better to clean it slowly over time than in one big glunk. if it happened like you said and a bunch of carbon when into the intake valve through the cylinder and out of the exhaust valve, through the cat and then the exhaust there were plenty of places for the "chunks" of carbon to get stuck in the system before getting blown out of the exhaust.

I would bet you worked some carbon loose and maybe cause a stuck valve condition until the car backfired and freed the valve up. It might have worked but its not the type of maintenance I would recommend.

It would have probably been better to start doing it at 50k as regular maintenance, unfortunately I didn't know jack about cars back then. There is a video on YouTube of someone having the same clunking and banging using CRC IVD cleaner on a Veloster (using essentially the same engine). It's now going onto my regular maintenance schedule every 20k along with a transmission drain and refill. The second treatment was not as alarming.

 

[MrLemonade]

Yeah, I'm now putting Seafoam in my tanks. I'm hoping to see some cleaning action. Got a bunch of new smoke from my Tundra w/ 250k miles. Hoping it's "cleaning action" going on and nothing serious.... Was initially worried but think it's just cleaning out gunk. TBC.

 

[Accent Abuser]

Yeah, I'm now putting Seafoam in my tanks. I'm hoping to see some cleaning action. Got a bunch of new smoke from my Tundra w/ 250k miles. Hoping it's "cleaning action" going on and nothing serious.... Was initially worried but think it's just cleaning out gunk. TBC.

I think something with PEA like Techron is better for fuel treatment, especially if the vehicle is MPI not GDI, I've been using PEA fuel additives every ~5k miles as long as I've had the vehicle and the injectors work flawlessly. Only reason I even did the seafoam is because the idle was very rough and this particular engine is known for the intake getting dirty and idling rough because of that. It was getting bad enough that any variation in load at idle (even something as simple as the electrical load varying such as the electric cooling fan cycling on and off) that it would flutter and shake until the ECM was able to correct it, this problem was completely solved via the seafoam. TBH I didn't even expect it to do much but it worked surprisingly well.

 

[OilUzer]

So what's the best or ideal procedure for using seafoam in DI engines to clean ivd?
Dump some in the gas tank every few thousand miles?

 

[Wylie6G72]

So what's the best or ideal procedure for using seafoam in DI engines to clean ivd?
Dump some in the gas tank every few thousand miles?

Nothing you dump in the tank is going to touch intake valves on a D.I. engine. I removed my intake and cleaned mine manually with CRC intake valve cleaner and a vacuum. Spray, wait, scrub, vacuum, rinse, vacuum, rinse, vacuum.

You're probably ok spraying something into the intake while running on a non-turbo engine, but NEVER do this if you have a turbo.

CRC foams up when it reacts to the deposits, and takes a minute to take effect, so I can't imagine it doing much good spraying it into the intake while running. It might help, but in a very limited fashion.

Whatever product you choose, be careful of the amount you use, as bending a connecting rod won't make your engine run better.

 

[Silver]

 

[sk_pete]

for some reason, group of people like to buy "magic dust in a can".
they pour it to intake, exhaust, and oilpan (who knows elsewhere)...
sometimes it helps, sometimes not... and there is this thing called placebo effect. lol
as the document says, hdeo cleans also the intake side of turbo. i expect it should help with some ivd stuff...

continuous cleaning during the entire oci, makes more sense to me, than just 10minute miracle in a can....
https://certasenergylubricants.com/...shell-rimula-r6-lme-plus_product-brochure.pdf

 

[xmanjeff]

oh ill bet there are lots of people putting the stuff in the gas tank thinking they are cleaning deposits on there gdi engine

 

[Accent Abuser]

for some reason, group of people like to buy "magic dust in a can".
they pour it to intake, exhaust, and oilpan (who knows elsewhere)...
sometimes it helps, sometimes not... and there is this thing called placebo effect. lol
as the document says, hdeo cleans also the intake side of turbo. i expect it should help with some ivd stuff...

continuous cleaning during the entire oci, makes more sense to me, than just 10minute miracle in a can....
https://certasenergylubricants.com/...shell-rimula-r6-lme-plus_product-brochure.pdf

It's not really magic or even snake oil. Ever heard of an air/fuel induction service? That's pretty much what you're doing spraying seafoam into the intake.

Nothing is going to remove intake valve deposits from a GDI engine except going straight into the intake. Oil, fuel treatments etc have no effect on them. If anything, hdeo could (over time) make IVDs worse due to the high SA content.

 

[ZedzAmg]

Run a gdi valve cleaner right at the throttle body, let it soak for 10 minutes and drive the car.

 

[sk_pete]

Seafoam is alcohol- kerosene or Stoddart mix. Pretty mild for baked dirt. Higher boiling point parts may stay in oil for long time. Not sure i would like that..

 

[ka9mnx]

I use Seafoam in the fuel for my OPE and F150, which doesn't get driven much. I use it as a fuel preservative. Watching OPE mechanics on Youtube, yea I know, they all seem to think it works better, and longer, in preserving fuel than Sta-Bil. Seafoam claims 2 years and Sta-Bil claims 1 year. I'm quite pleased with Seafoam and my OPE's seem to start easier and run better.